


Death in her eyes, stain on her lips, blood on her hands

by the_authors_exploits



Series: Gotham's Queen [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics)
Genre: Character Study, Genderbending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-18 06:24:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13094289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_authors_exploits/pseuds/the_authors_exploits
Summary: She rules Gotham, but that's not all she is





	Death in her eyes, stain on her lips, blood on her hands

**Author's Note:**

> I planned for this to be longer, but ehh here you go

It’s good to be afraid; good to fear, good to kick and scream when the Red Hood comes to get you. She’s like a grim reaper with her long legs—strengthened by muscles—and catty nails. Never long enough to be a hazard but enough to harm; those who last long enough to get her hood off—and live to tell the tale—can attest to pearly whites spread out in a deviled smile of red.

And her eyes; her eyes, hidden behind a second mask, are burning death. She is every demon brought to life, nightmares a reality, and the last thing you’ll ever see is the muzzle of a gun in your face.

She’s not the first female drug lord, nor will she be the last; her mark will certainly last eons, however, sidelong with Joker, Riddler, a thousand other maniacs that can’t seem to be shaken. She rules the streets; takes each sector by blood, a bag of severed heads, a box for the hands. You get two chances and then you’re out; one hand, the other, then your head rolls.

She’s strict like that, but no one blames her; after all, you should know better than to waste her kindness. Everyone knows that, so no sympathy when she cuts you off; just turned heads and an ignorant audience as she puts a gun to your head and pulls the trigger.

Rumors say she was spit from the depths of hell itself, regurgitated in fire and clawed up from the dirt, sent up like a demon to drag guilty souls to their doom. If rumors aren’t enough, just look at her eyes; if you get the chance to. And if you do, you’ll see death

Because that’s what she is; she is death dressed in leather, the devil on a motorbike, power in her eyes and hellfire at her heels. The streets are hers, the people are hers, to protect as much as order; she is queen of Gotham, ruler of the underworld.

But that is what you see; the blood on her hands, the soulless glimmer in her body, the dirt under her nails. What you don’t see is her going home to a six bedroom penthouse; what you don’t see is her cooking dinner, a pot of mac and cheese, hotdogs bubbling in another, a pan of vegetables and sausages sizzling in organic oil.

What you don’t hear is her calling out for someone to set the table, what you don’t see is eight pairs of feet clattering down the hall; children, the Red Hood’s children, her brood in her nest.

“Don’t forget cups! And get the sippy for Danny; Georgie, where’s you brother?” Red Hood twists about to see all the room; wearing sweats and a loose shirt, her hair unkempt, she is as powerful here as she is on the streets. “Theo, get that out of your mouth!”

“Where are the forks, Mama?”

“Dishwasher, sweetie.”

This is her domain; a street rat, now criminal queen, reigning alongside her other street orphans. They won’t inherit her kingdom, but they will inherit her fortune; violence is not for them, and she ensures they never see her business side. Here, however, in the penthouse apartment the children have no need to worry or fear or fend for themselves.

Red Hood is a devil on the streets, and an angel at home; she is balance and poise, regality wrapped in a mesh of thorns, kindness and fatality.

As she sits down to dinner with her large family, the streets grow dimmer in anticipation of her nightly vengeance; but, for the moment, she laughs at a story her son chatters about, complimenting her daughter for the grade on her test, and reminding Eric to eat his vegetables.

But you don’t know that; all you know is that you fucked up your second chance. So you hide and hunker and await the call of the reaper’s scythe, stylized as a bullet.


End file.
